Xangô POV: Day 55

Current Wealth: 2 gold 31 silver 47 copper

The villagers had given us a bit of food for the road, and we were grateful for it. Not as grateful as we were for the carriage though.

It wasn’t to keep of course, they didn’t have so many that they could afford to let us do that- they didn’t have more than one in fact- but we were allowed to sit in and ride along as they sent their first venture out to try and buy some of the resources that might help them rebuild. Henri was the one driving it, the old man who’d first called on us to defend Rinchester. Somehow that felt appropriate. Appropriate, and…Satisfying.

He still had that bottomless sadness to him, maybe always would, but there was a certain hope to the old man now that uplifted me as I saw it. He was seated, driving, in the font, happily chatting away with us all as we made our way to the carriage. Him and Helena.

Unexpectedly, the Vittonian woman seemed to have started getting rather comfortable alongside us already. I imagined that had something to do with the impression we’d made, but part of it was surely just her general…Hardiness. I’d met soft people before, and she was on the exact opposite end of that spectrum, reminding me of Solitaire or Beam. Adaptable, practical, malleable. It was a good trait to find in someone I’d be entrusting to protect and fight alongside me, and it didn’t go unappreciated.

The cold was still a present thing of course, but even that felt like it’d abated. Perhaps our ever-strengthening bodies were just more resilient, perhaps it was the magical, emotional glow of knowing we’d made the world a better place. Perhaps it was the extra blankets. Either way, things were looking up.

But our journey was days long, and the woods were far less densely packed by rotters after we’d thinned the horde by some few hundred. It seemed likely the vampire had moved on, and even if not, we weren’t entirely worried at the prospect of fighting him after strengthening ourselves so much and weakening his little army. This gave us plenty of time to think.

Think and worry.

Well, being fair, we actually didn’t have that much to worry about. We were well-funded, ish, and had about 250 extra kilos of muscle to back us up on the off-chance that our flawless ethics and persuasive arguments failed to move any more natives. But there were a lot of factors to consider before we started expanding more.

Namely, the simple split between brute force and chemistry.

“We have the money for sulphur, for anything now. I can make us shit you wouldn’t even believe.” Solitaire insisted, more eager than I’d have liked. Even as a kid he’d spoken the same way about explosives and incendiaries, and it was more than I could take now that the topic had moved onto using them on living breathing people.

Quite apart from that, I wasn’t certain about the rationality of it.

“Being known as people who can do that might bring unwanted trouble, and I’m not sure it’s the most cost-effective way of producing weapons anyway.” I countered. “You did say you’d only be able to make a few kilos of gunpowder with all the money we had, right? How often are we going to be getting into big enough fights that that will kill enough to justify the price?”

It felt quite simple, framed as a business decision, and I was still awaiting Solitaire’s answer when Helena cut in.

“Wait, you’re not actual wizards?”

I eyed her, and Solitaire laughed.

“You saw the vampire talking about us using foreign alchemy.” He noted. She didn’t seem amused.

“Foreign alchemy is magic, no?”

“No.” He replied, with alarming patience. “No more than cooking is. When you mix certain things in certain conditions, they can change their very substance, combining or separating. Some of these combinations have effects that neither of the smaller parts do. Think of it like mixing fire and ice, if you want. Neither one is a liquid, but combining them lets you produce something that is.”

That got a thoughtful look on her, and I allowed myself a moment to admire Solitaire’s explanation. For all his talk of being the poor, tortured genius surrounded by plebeian ape-men, he could certainly simplify things when he needed to.

“Can we get back to the argument?” I prodded, and Solitaire jumped into speech again like a spring being released.

“Right, yes, you’re wrong and stupid, let me explain why.” He cleared his throat. “I’m going to make a gun.”

I paused, eyed him, and felt my excitement growing. Then he spoke.

“It’s not going to be an automatic weapon before you ask, but it’s also not going to just be a dumbass muzzle-loader either. Should manage a fire rate of 30-60 rounds per minute if it works out, though I’ll probably need a blacksmith to actually make the components.”

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I wasn’t ever much good at thinking through numbers, but even I could picture how rapid that sort of fire rate was compared to the bows we’d started getting used to. More to the point, Solitaire had made it abundantly clear over the years how deadly a supersonic chunk of lead was compared to virtually any man-powered weapon. I sighed.

“Alright then.” I conceded. “We’ll start working on a gun.”

Solitaire grinned, Beam eyed him uncertainly, and Argar and Helena just looked confused. I was actually looking forward to seeing their reaction to the weapon once it was finally made.

The last leg of our journey breezed by quickly enough, passed with more casual conversation as we familiarised ourselves with our new member and went over some of the highlights from our most recent fight. Beam was perhaps the loudest, repeatedly ensuring that we were vividly aware he had, in fact, beaten up a vampire. I almost wished he’d lost just so the smug bastard would keep quiet about it.

One early morning, then, we were back at the city of Wolney. Carriage rattling up to its front gate, awkward and shaky as any we’d ridden here. This time, though, the guards halted us.

“Names?” One of them asked, I answered, and the man paused. “I don’t believe you have clearance to be inside the city today.”

“Clearance?” I asked, genuinely confused. There’d been no need for clearance the last time we came here. The man only nodded, distractedly.

“Clearance sir, new gate watch I’m afraid.”

That left a sour taste in my mouth, but I pushed it back as I answered.

“Well…Can I speak with your boss, or…Perhaps we can work another arrangement out?”

I didn’t want to part with any of our newly claimed money, but if it meant getting inside it didn’t seem I had much choice.

The man hesitated, then nodded.

“Yes, one moment sir.” He disappeared into the walls, and wasn’t gone even a second before Solitaire spoke.

“He’s going to try and kill us.”

I rolled my eyes, and Solitaire slammed a fist down into the carriage. “No, fuck you, he’s going to, listen to me for once please.”

Solitaire was speaking fast, tongue tripping over itself, eyes wide. I recognised all the signs of an encroaching paranoia attack, and knew in an instant that there wasn’t much anyone could do to talk him down from it. I forced myself calm, meeting his eye to let him focus on me .

“Alright, sorry, I’m willing to listen at least. Why do you think that?”

“He recognised us.” Solitaire said, instantly. “And he’s afraid. He knows who we are, knows what we can do, and knows that we’ll be inclined to kill him. He’s gone off to tell someone- probably the person who told him to watch out for us- that we’ve finally turned up. Mark my words, he’ll be back with a…An army, or a gang, or something.”

I did my best to pick out each word from the syllabic soup he was spewing out, and considered them.

When Solitaire said he saw something in a person- emotion or deception- he actually wasn’t usually wrong. Which made this worth looking into, at least. I didn’t know about some ambush, but I could believe the guard had recognised us, his behaviour had felt stilted to me, too.

“I could scale the wall.” Beam offered. “Peer over the top, see what he comes back with.”

“Yes.” Solitaire pressed. “The barracks is hundreds of metres from the gate, you’ll see them coming from miles off.”

I considered it, but not for long. There weren’t that many reasons not to.

“Just don’t slip and die.” I advised my friend. Beam smiled, hurrying to the wall and scaling it.

Just a precaution, just a safeguard, just a way of helping Solitaire ground himself for however long his newest spike of neurosis took to run its course. Nothing was going to come of it.

Anyway, it came as quite a surprise when Beam dropped down 30 feet, landed in the snow with a grunting thud I can only guess would’ve broken something when he’d first arrived here, and hurried to the carriage.

“It’s fucking Corvan.” He snapped. “The guard is coming with Corvan, we need to go, we need to fucking go right now!”

Well, that put a wind under our heels.

Solitaire babbled about how right he was, and how stupid we all were, and how it was our fault a big, evil wizard was going to vaporise us. To his credit, he was quick in working even while he did, ordering the carriage around. The old man seemed to trust us enough not to hesitate, and we were lurching along quickly, mules lashed and dragging us along almost as fast as a man could sprint.

“How far was he?” Solitaire snapped at Beam. Our friend thought for an agonisingly long moment before replying.

“A few hundred metres, maybe- maybe three?”

Solitaire cursed. “Three minutes, then, we’ll be half a mile away if we’re lucky. He might catch us if he has his own mount tethered nearby.”

A silence fell, all of us realising, at that, that only luck would keep us from him. How had the bastard survived?

Stupid question, obviously he was more jumpy and quick than we’d expected. How had he found us?

Again, stupid. We’d headed straight to the nearest city.

I cursed my own stupidity, my own laxness, even as I felt the wind picking up as we accelerated. Tearing along into the snow. Where could we go? Where to?

“Elswick.” Solitaire growled. “Random city, plucked from my mind, do you know where it is?” His question addressed the old man, who looked back at him, fearful, and nodded.

“What’s happening?” He asked.

“Something very dangerous.” I replied. “But not something that we don’t have a chance of getting away from. Hurry on.”

Without another word, he did.